


Unfortunate

by JCapasso



Series: The Long Sleep [3]
Category: The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-05
Updated: 2020-07-05
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:33:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25081687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JCapasso/pseuds/JCapasso
Summary: Damon and Elena wake from their long sleep into a post-apocalyptic wasteland.Alternate sequel to Somnolence.Warning: vaguely implied rape
Relationships: Elena Gilbert/Damon Salvatore
Series: The Long Sleep [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1816255
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	Unfortunate

Elena jolted back to reality with a sharp breath and instinctively panicked for a moment before she caught herself. In her defense anyone would panic waking up in a coffin next to a desiccated body. She took a deep breath to steady herself before reaching up and pushing the lid of the coffin open. Getting a look at Damon’s body was even worse than feeling it and she felt the tears welling up in her eyes at what he must be going through right now. Finding him some blood was her first priority now that the mind link was broken.

Her muscles were stiff and sore from disuse, but she had been perfectly preserved so that was her only issue at the moment other than the slight hunger that she could easily ignore. She gently untangled herself from Damon and climbed out of the coffin, glad that Bonnie had made the last minute addition of the fresh air spell, otherwise she couldn’t have imagined what it would smell like in here. She took a deep breath before opening the door for the first time in who even knew how long, ready to go hunt down some blood, even if it had to be a living person until she figured out where the blood banks were in this time.

She was more than a little surprised that she didn’t have to. The moment the door was open, Ric was there, handing her a bottle of blood. She squealed and jumped into his arms, giving him a huge hug. It didn’t last long though due to both their worries about Damon and Ric followed her in as she started feeding him the blood. It didn’t take long before Damon was drinking on his own and by the time the bag was empty, he was moving around. He still looked more than a little grey and very weak as he sat up. When he saw Ric he grinned before saying, “I really hope you brought more than one of those.”

Ric chuckled tensely. “Nice to see you too, buddy. And yes. I have a some more in the car. For both of you. Just wanted to get you up and moving first.”

Elena and Ric both helped Damon out of the coffin, and when Damon leaned heavily on Ric from weakness, he took the opportunity to grip him in a brief hug before they started moving. Elena was the first to notice that Ric looked more haggard than she remembered and for a vampire that was saying something. That was nothing compared to her shock of stepping outside the tomb into vast wasteland. “What the hell?” she asked fearfully, looking back to see the crypt was the only thing standing as far as the eye could see. 

“It’s a long story, and Damon at least needs some more blood first,” Ric said wearily. They were both more than a little worried as they followed him to the rusted out hunk that he called a car. Ric opened a cooler with a few more bottles in it. Elena grabbed one and started to drink as Damon downed one almost as quickly as he had the first and then opened a third, guzzling about half of it before he started to sip like Elena. 

“Okay. I’m halfway steady now. Why does this place look like a bomb went off and why are we drinking blood from bottles instead of bags?” Damon asked. 

“Well, Damon, it looks like a bomb went off because it did. It turns out that Bonnie’s joke about her spells being able to survive a nuclear bomb weren’t so much jokes after all,” Ric told him, leaning against the hood of the car. 

“Oh my god,” Elena breathed out. “Then…Mystic Falls…”

“Gone. For about fifteen years now,” Ric told them. 

“How long has it been? Since we…you know…went to sleep?” Damon asked. 

“Forty two years.”

“And…everyone else?” Elena asked, trying not to burst into tears. 

“I’m the only one left,” Ric sighed. “Stefan and Caroline took the cure about five years after you two went under and settled at the boarding house. Even had a couple kids. Named them after you two. They got wiped out in the initial blast. Along with Jeremy and everyone else in town. Jo, Bonnie, and I happened to be across the country at the time, trying to find some of the Gemini coven’s lost resources for Bonnie to use.”

“Oh god,” Elena breathed again and only Damon’s arms around her kept her on his feet as he fought his own tears. He had known that Stefan being gone when he woke up was a possibility, but not like this. And his kids…Damon’s nieces and nephews…his family…everything gone. They had both lost everything. Again. 

Ric needed to get the rest of the story out though. They deserved to know. They /needed/ to know. “It wasn’t just here. It was all over the world. The nuclear holocaust they called it. Jo lasted about a year afterwards. Until she tried to help someone with radiation sickness. There wasn’t any gear available though. She got sick and died two months later. Then it was just me and Bonnie. I did what I could to protect her, Damon. Just like you asked. But with so much radiation in the air…she got sick a few months ago. Cancer probably not that there are any hospitals functioning anymore for a real diagnosis. Once she knew she didn’t have long left, she sent me here. Even went so far as to magically bar me from the house so I wouldn’t have a choice. I didn’t want to leave her, but…” 

Elena surged forward and wrapped him in a tight hug, crying against his chest. He hugged her back and rested his head on hers as his own tears fell once again. Damon reached out a hand to Ric’s shoulder as much to steady himself as to support his best friend. “I’m sorry,” Damon said sadly, seeing that Elena was beyond words. 

Once they had themselves more or less under control, they got in the car that both Damon and Elena were surprised actually ran, and started driving. Damon grabbed another bottle of blood to drink on the road and none of them spoke. Ric didn’t want to have to give them any more bad news right now and neither Damon nor Elena could take any more. They needed to process what they knew now. They drove for about ten minutes before they reached anything but wasteland and then they drove through dead vegetation for another twenty minutes before they saw anything alive again. It was a winding trail more than a road, through the forest that had clearly been driven often before they found a relatively nice house sitting in the middle of the woods. 

“Bonnie has this place enchanted and protected up the wazoo,” Ric told them. “Come on inside.” 

As they walked in the door, Damon and Elena were surprised to find a little girl jumping into Ric’s arms. “Daddy, I woke up and you were gone and Mommy’s door locked and I was scared…is that Uncle Damon and Aunt Elena?” the chattering girl finally noticed the other guests. 

“Yes, sweetie. It is,” Ric said with a smile, turning towards them. He probably should have told them this part at least, but he didn’t know how to bring it up. “Guys meet Faith Bennett. The last Bennett.” 

“Mommy’s gone isn’t she?” Faith said with a sniffle. 

“Yes, sweetie. She went to peace to be with the other Bennetts,” Ric told her. She’d been told what was happening when Bonnie got sick. “Why don’t you go play in your room while I talk to Uncle Damon and Aunt Elena, okay?” 

“Kay,” she said as he put her down and she went off to play. 

“Is she…” Elena started, but couldn’t find a way to ask the question politely. 

“Yes, she’s Bonnie’s daughter and no I’m not her biological father. I don’t know who her father is other than that I killed him. Let’s just say the surviving humans are no better than animals and leave it at that.” 

Damon’s eyes narrowed as he got the hint. It took Elena a moment longer, but she gasped when she got it. “Too bad you couldn’t leave a piece of him for me,” Damon growled. 

“I did,” Ric smirked. “The first bottle of blood I gave you. I thought you would appreciate it. Kept it on ice for years.” Damon gave a cruel smirk back and nodded his thanks. That just made his first meal even better in hindsight. “Either way, Faith was a miracle. Bonnie was fifty-five when she was conceived. She thinks that it was the magic trying to make sure the line continued.” 

“That makes sense,” Elena said sadly. “As much as I wish that we could take our time to come to terms with everything, I think we need to know the whole picture. What the world is like now.” Damon pulled her into his lap as comfort for them both as he nodded his agreement. 

“Well as far as the world as a whole, I don’t know much. Communications went down after the bombs which means no news. I know that there is a relatively large settlement of humans about two miles in that direction through the woods. Most of the survivors that made it out of the DC area. That’s why we settled here. We’re close enough to the hot zone that we’re not really bothered even without the spells Bonnie layered on this place.” 

“Apparently vampires are immune to radiation?” Elena guessed since they were obviously right in the middle of the hot zone. 

“Apparently,” Ric told her. “I guess no one ever bothered to test that before, but it seems that way. Not that there are many of us left either. Hell, for all I know those of us in this room are the last. I used to find a lot of starved and desiccated vampires around as their food source died off, but I haven’t seen any in a while. I would assume that there are others out there though.”

“This settlement you mentioned…is it big enough to support all three of us?” Damon asked. 

“Yeah. That was a main concern in deciding where to live. There’s another group in the opposite direction of the crypt, but it’s a lot smaller and we knew you’d be waking up eventually, so…”

“I don’t know how I feel about feeding from living people,” Elena said nervously. She’d always been more than a little squeamish about that, preferring to use the blood bags. 

“Believe me, Elena. For most of those people it would be a relief to die a quick death,” Ric told her. “And most of them deserve nothing less.” 

“Like the one that hurt Bonnie,” Damon pointed out to her. 

“Yes. Like that one,” Ric said tightly. “There are two types of people in the world now. The few that actually work and try to grow food and feed people and the ones who take everything they can through threats, violence, and/or intimidation. And there are far more of the latter than the former.” 

“And every one of those we can take out just helps the situation and gives humanity a better chance to survive in the long run,” Damon nodded, fully understanding the situation. 

“I need to go start dinner for Faith. I’ll let you two process for a while,” Ric said as he got up and left the room. 

Elena turned and cried on Damon’s shoulder. “Can we just go back to the mindscape?” she asked hopefully. 

Damon gave a sad sigh as he kissed her head. “I don’t know if it’ll work if we both desiccate. Plus that would leave Ric alone again with a little kid to raise. Do you really want to do that to him?” 

“No. I guess not,” Elena sniffled. “But I don’t know if I can do this. Live like this.”

“Shh…it’ll be okay, baby. As long as we have each other we can survive anything remember?” he said soothingly. “You don’t have to live feed. You can just stay here with Faith and Ric and I will bring you dinner and you can pretend it’s just like the blood bags you used to eat. I’ll take care of you, Elena. Always.” 

“But you shouldn’t have to. I should be strong enough to survive on my own,” she said despondently. 

“The world takes all kinds of people Elena,” Damon said gently. “Eventually humanity will recover and the world will get back to some semblance of normal. Good gentle people like you will be needed if we’re ever gonna get there. We’ll be okay, baby. I promise.” 

Elena nodded as her tears continued to fall on Damon’s neck and he held her tightly. “As long as we have each other,” she managed to say.


End file.
